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Topic: Dual Fuel Gingery Type Furnace (Read 36389 times)

inthesticks

Ha Ha UFO yes. Thanks Dave. Drop the temp. 40* and it sounds like my winters. The dog days of summer are here thier forcasting a week 30+* hot and humid.Guess I'll spend the day getting some color riding the lawn tractor all day.

CheersCB

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inthesticks

Got a couple of things done today. For safety I changed the direction the hoses connect to the burner, directing them away from the furnace I also shortend the burner blower barrel by 1". Made a base to bolt the fan to, it is held down by 2 large 1/2" wingnuts and is adjustable in or out 2" or easily removed altogether.It looks putzy but I taped up transition piece to seal joints.One of first castings should be a proper transition piece.

inthesticks

Thats it I'm done for today hit 40*C with the humidity out there today. Couple pictures, completed the fan wiring. And moving on did a dry lay-up of the propane fuel trane. Still need to get 2-6" brass nipples and 2 brass elbows to replace the iron you see in the picture. The 2 black quik connects, connect to the 2-30# tanks and the yellow capped POL connects to the 100# tank. The yellow 3 way valve selects either the 100# tank OR the 2 30# tanks. The pressure reducers are rated 0-30 psi and 0-60 psi. The reason for 2 reducers, the dual fuel oil burner will never require more than 15# but the atmospheric burner I plan to build will require as much as 30# or more. Either or both can be used if press allows, no problem on a day like today.

inthesticks

Cooled down enough to break out the welder today. Cut and welded up a stand for the propane piping and painted it up. Should be dry enough to install and complete the piping tomorrow. Aquired and installed a barrel pump on my WMO barrel. Hopefully this is the only barrel I will ever need.

inthesticks

Installed propane piping stand and piped up the fuel trane. Nobody is stocking 6" brass nipples, went with galvanized, could not find a conflict in propane code book. Sprayed all joints down with soap and water and turned on the propane, one small leak at 3 way valve, 1/2 turn on fitting and all is good. Set low press. regulator to 10 psi and high press. regulator to 25 psi for now. Ready for service, will modify a barbecue cover to keep the weather off when not in use. Fittings for my atmospheric burner should arrive Tuesday, refractory and paint and were ready to put a fire in it.

inthesticks

Almost forgot I still had another crucible failure catch tray to make and install. I used the dome out of what was left of the water tank I used for the furnace shell. Sliced of 2 sides and welded on angle iron sides/slides. Welded 2 more slides under deck. The dome is 3 1/2" deep at center, 1 1/2"s of sand built up on sides will easily contain the contents of a A8 crucible. Now its ready for refractory and paint, till I remember something else.

inthesticks

Spent the afternoon cutting/shaping insulating firebrick. Did a dry lay-up of all the firebrick I will be using . Its not perfect but its a forgiving process everything will be thinly buttered with morter and all interior surfaces covered with a 1" Uni-Cast 70 hotface including the bottom drain hole.The floor will get a 1 1/2" hotface.The burner port is not yet cut in the pictures.I ended up using less than half of the brick I had, so a few projects left thier yet. I also got more than half a 5 gallon pail of fines and offcuts which when easily crushed into granular and mixed with fireclay will make a good high temp insulating castable for the lid.The tops of the bricks will be finished off with 1/2" morter for a smooth finish.

inthesticks

Well fittings for atmospheric burner didn't arrive today as promised so decided to cast up lid.

The pictures1. Welded rack bolts to lid and welded ready rod to bolt heads. Rapped rods with wire to support refractory and installed fender washers on ends for extra support.2. Turned down piece of firewood with slight taper for vent hole.3. The insulating mix 1 part fireclay 2 parts crushed insulating firebrick.4. Wrapped vent plug with saran wrap (hopefully it will release). Filled lid with mix tappered down around vent and left 1" for the hotface.5. Mixed and poured the hotface and made up 2 plith blocks with my leftover.

Covered all with plastic to allow curing overnight. Will give it a light spray before turning in tonight.

inthesticks

Cut the burner port in the brick lining this morning. Turned up a pattern for casting the burner tube. It is made in 2 parts because the pattern cannot be removed in either direction as 1 piece. A centered screw allows the 2 pieces to be seperated. The pattern has a 15* flare where the flaring flame would imping on the refractory.

inthesticks

Compleated building the atmospheric burner. It is based on the Ron Reil burners and Rupert Wenig modifications. My gas jet is a salvaged air jet drilled to a #52 drill. My bell reducer is 2 1/2" to insure sufficient air at high settings. This burner does not require a fan so when not burning oil this would be the preffered burner, it does require higher gas pressure. Rather than get too long winded here I am including 2 PDF's from Ron Reil's site. If you like this sort of stuff, please visit Ron's site, thiers lots more there.

Uncovered lid and removed vent pattern. Only scared vent hole a little bit. Will leave to dry till it can be fired.

inthesticks

Thanks OZ, she may look good but is she hot, if I can build a flare mabye I'll try it out on the vise tonight. Nothing at all I could play with and read about this stuff 24/7. Not everyone is of this opinion though.

CheersCB

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inthesticks

She's more than hot , She's hellfire. Cobbled together a flare out of a couple of old fittings, wasn't shure it would work, flares are not needed installed in furnace but for bench testing they are neccesary. Moved my portable vise outside and set up for tonight.

Flame pictures1. Shortly after start up-carburizing flame2. cranking it up-oxidizing flame3. Nuetral flame to slightely carburizing-the flame we want for melting4. Flare turned cherry red in less than 2 minutes after start-up. Here the leading edge is starting to turn yellow. For fear of melting it off I did not go any higher on my settings. Both the needle valve and the choke were less than half open.5 and 6 are 2 more veiws of the flame.

inthesticks

Hi Tom. I was surprised given how rough the flare was. I cut a 15* taper in the fitting but given the thickness of the fitting it only extends 3/4" into the mouth of the flare, it then flattens out till it makes the jump to the smaller burner pipe size. A proper flare would be a little longer with a full 15* taper. The burner was a little unstable at the bottom end (normal for this type of burner) but settled down as soon as I started increasing the firing rate and remained very stable as far as I took it with a nice steady evan roar.

CheersCB

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inthesticks

Completed the patterns to finish the refractory pour. Did the big pour yesterday, the bricks have to be soaked in water before installation so they don't dry out the hotface to quickly and the uni-cast 70 has a short work time. This made for a pretty intense proccess and I forgot to take pictures. Left overnight to cure. Removed form and patterns this morning still a little soft so some of the corners chipped. To wait till it hardened up much more would make it very hard to remove form and patterns and possibly cause even more damage. Vesuveius morter is great to repair these touchups. The darker shiny spots is where I have just applied it.

I will let this all dry for another 3 days then I will periodicaly fire it for a couple of days till I reach red heat.

inthesticks

Thanks for the support Tom. It was a workout for this old body to coordinate, the floor is a little rough it was out of reach under the bottom pattern on the form when I vibrated the works. The plith sits true so its not a big deal. I had intended to apply a high temp. gasket between the bottom two sections, I was convinced it was not needed. If I find this a problem I can still add one on the underside of the middle section.

I guess its ready for a good clean-up and paint job before I light a fire in it.

Cheers Tom CB

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inthesticks

Did the furnace clean-up yesterday, came across a problem in the lift assembly. The unsuported end of the top pulley was deflecting with the added weight of the refractory, occasionally dragging the cable instead of turning. Not good. I suspected it was to easy a solution when I pulled it out of the junk box but hindsight is 20/20 as they say. So back to the junk box we go. This is what I came up with. Installed this morning and tried it out. Works great no hang-ups.

inthesticks

Started firing the furnace to dry out the lining this morning. Tried out the dual burner on gas for the first time. Lights easy and runs good at low end, did not crank it up as the lining started to steam shortly after lighting. The fan inlet damper is barely open in the badly focused flame picture. Shut the burner down when the steaming started to peek. I checked the internal wall temp after shutdown 329*F. I will let cool and fire it a couple more times today going a little higher on the temp. each time.